A massive altercation broke out Friday afternoon amongst security prisoners from Fatah and Islamic Jihad factions incarcerated at the Shata prison. The fight erupted after one of the prisoner leaders delivered a Friday sermon in which he criticized Palestinian President
Mahmoud Abbas for meeting with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
Following the sermon, which defined Olmert as “our enemy,” a mass quarrel broke out among roughly 150 of the prisoners. Prisoners belonging to the Fatah faction were angered by the criticism of their leader as well as by the fact that the religious leader delivering the sermon involved politics in a sermon meant only to deal with religious issues.
After the sermon, the prisoners returned to their cells, but the arguments among them continued. Later when the prisoners were let outside to the prison yard, the squabbles continued, and quickly devolved into a physical fight, with the prisoners fist-fighting and hurling chairs at each other.
Wardens entered the prison yard to break up the fights, during which two prisoners were injured and required medical attention.
The man who delivered the sermon and those involved in the fights were transferred to solitary confinement and will stand disciplinary hearings. The Prisons Authority said that an investigation into the incident was launched.
Meanwhile at the Nafha prison, an Islamic leader imprisoned there was put in solitary confinement after he delivered a sermon Friday saying that “We must return to the Jihad war against our enemies to liberate the Muslim nation.”
The prisoner cited the events on Gaza beach last week. He was also to be given a disciplinary hearing.
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